Jurassic Park star Jeff Goldblum has revealed that he's given up eating meat after playing the villainous Wizard of Oz in Wicked.
Speaking during an interview on British chat show This Morning, Goldblum said that portraying Oz's all-powerful ruler had "changed" him as a person, in particular due to his character's cruelty towards animals.
In last year's Wicked: Part 1, viewers saw the film's talking animals persecuted and rounded up on the orders of the Wizard, as the creatures lose their ability to speak. The animals' plight then continues as a major story thread — set to be shown in this year's concluding movie, Wicked: For Good.
Over the years, many have commented on Wicked's portrayal of animals as a metaphor for marginalized groups silenced by authorities. Both the story's stage and film versions are designed to generate significant empathy for their animal characters, and the Wicked movies have been praised for using CGI, rather than real animals on set.
"It's changed me. You know, after doing this movie — we talked about the animal cruelty — I stopped eating meat and poultry," Goldblum said. "So this Christmas and Thanksgiving, I may be having another... something else."
Explaining his decision, Goldblum continued: "We need the world to work for everybody on Earth and every creature too."
An excerpt from the official blurb for Wicked: For Good mentions the following:
"Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo), now demonized as The Wicked Witch of the West, lives in exile, hidden within the Ozian forest while continuing her fight for the freedom of Oz’s silenced Animals and desperately trying to expose the truth she knows about The Wizard (Jeff Goldblum)."
Wicked: For Good will reunite Goldblum and Erivo with co-stars Ariana Grande as Glinda and Michelle Yeoh as Madame Morrible when the movie hits theaters later this month, on November 21, 2025.
Photo by Samir Hussein/WireImage.
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